The Kitchen Restaurant Review

One of my favorite things about Wichita has been the revitalization of Old Town, especially along Douglas.  The area had looked run down for years, with the historic train depots sitting mostly idle and a lot of empty store front spaces.  One of the newest restaurants to take over a space in this area is The Kitchen, a New American restaurant that prides itself on using seasonal selections and a friendly atmosphere.

My wife and I went around 1230, deciding to get a nice lunch to celebrate our anniversary.  We were greeted when we came in by a call from the kitchen saying to seat ourselves at any open table.  Our server came over promptly and took drink orders, as well as our appetizer order (I have mentioned before my wife loves appetizers right?)  We settled on the spinach artichoke dip. 

The house made tortilla chips had a good crunch and the right amount fo salt.  The spinach dip was ok.  I think the amount of artichoke was a little low to the high amount of spinach.  Not bad, just not a show stopper.

My wife ordered for her lunch an ultimate grilled cheese sandwich, while I ordered the Italian Panini.  We both decided to up order to the side of fries, largely because the chips were a small bag of unknown distributor. 

I wish I had this a little less blurry, but I was holding the baby

Both our sandwiches were excellent.  Mine was stuffed with meat, and the mozzarella cheese was super melty.  The tomato tapenade was not really prevalent, but helped provide a little acidity to the sandwich.  My wife also enjoyed her's, which had a little more of the tapenade than mine did.  It featured Havarti, cheddar and brie inside of it.  We both agreed the fries were very good, with a good crispness and good salt.

All in all we had an enjoyable lunch  The wait staff was very friendly and  our wait was very short.  The dining room was at a great temperature as well.  The only complaint we had was the price.  My wife's sandwich was a bit small, and it was nine dollars.  Mine was well stuffed, but eleven dollars was pretty steep for a sandwich and chips.  Not the biggest complaint in the world but the value was not as high as I would have hoped.